The art of woodworking has recently developed a new technique ("biscuit joining") for joining wood workpieces which offers substantial advantages over the previously conventional techniques such as gluing and doweling. In the practice of this technique, half-oval slots are cut by a rotary saw blade in the mating surfaces of two workpieces, and special oval biscuits are then glued into these slots. The biscuits themselves are formed of pressed wood fiber which swells in the presence of woodworking glue, and they literally lock the joined workpieces together much more strongly than if dowels and glue were used to form the joint.
A number of power tools are now commercially available for cutting the special slots in wood workpieces which are required for biscuit joining, and which also must be accurately located and dimensioned in order to produce a proper biscuit joint. Further, the biscuits for these purposes are presently commercially available in three sizes, which are selectively used in accordance with the sizes of the workpieces to be joined, and it is essential in every case that the slots be precisely matched in dimensions to the size of the biscuits to be inserted therein.
The power tools ("biscuit joiners") which are currently available for use in biscuit joining are self-contained portable units that include their own drive motor but must be used in conjunction with a suitable worktable. Also, they are relatively expensive, having list prices ranging from about $200 to more than $500, and they have been criticized in home workshop periodicals as cumbersome to use.